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This year, the Park Scholarships program proudly graduated the Class of 2017. From a pool of 1,642 applicants in the fall of 2012, the Park Selection Committee saw in these then-high school seniors their potential to excel as scholars, leaders, and in service to their communities. Indeed, the Park Class of 2017 has made a significant impact at NC State and elsewhere throughout the nation and world – from parks and natural spaces here in the Research Triangle, to the Belize National Zoo, to an archaeological excavation site in the ancient city of Petra.

Krystal Smith ‘14 is passionate in her pursuit for intentionality. She has spent the past few years working as university engagement director and director of special projects for the Veritas Forum, an organization committed to creating opportunities for college students and faculty to engage in meaningful conversations.

Whether through its electronic devices, streaming media, or next-day delivery of items ranging from lentils to leotards, Amazon.com has revolutionized the retail realm for its hundreds of millions of users. As a senior business development manager for Amazon Campus, Elliott Welton ‘12 is playing a role in this consumerism paradigm shift.

Learning Lab I, an annual experience designed and implemented by freshman Park Scholars, affords students insight into leadership through the lens of a challenge currently facing the state of North Carolina. The Class of 2020 opted to explore the obstacles our state’s tribal leaders face in exercising their rights of tribal sovereignty and self-determination by discussing these topics with leaders of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians and the Lumbee Tribe. The class traveled to meet with both groups on their respective tribal lands—the former on the Qualla Boundary in Western N.C., and the latter in Pembroke, located near the state’s southern border.

This year marks the completion of the fifth annual Park Scholarships March Madness: a two-pronged, friendly competition between current scholars to see which class will have the highest percentage of donor participants and contribute the highest dollar amount in donations.

As most creative types will attest, art-making is an iterative process requiring close study and a willingness to adjust and blend ideas. Likewise, Claire Shigekawa Rennhack ‘08 has sculpted her academic and professional journey over time, ultimately discovering her niche at the intersection of engineering and architecture.

Since she was a child, Emma Thompson ’17 knew that she wanted to pursue a career in the medical field. While the southern Mississippi native entered NC State as an engineering major, she took advantage of her freshman year to explore and refine her academic interests.

Fast cars and yoga, on the surface at least, represent two different lifestyles—but Liv Adams ‘16 has struck a unique balance between these two worlds. A certified yoga instructor, Adams recently relocated to the San Francisco Bay Area to begin her engineering career at Tesla, Inc.

North Carolina State University’s Park Scholarships Class of 2019 will host the program’s inaugural Gerald H. Elkan Distinguished Lecture in Science and Society, featuring MacArthur Fellow and water quality engineer Dr. Marc Edwards, on Tuesday, March 21 from 5:30-6:30 pm. The lecture, entitled “Truth Seeking by the Lights of Perverted Science: Exposing the Flint Water Disaster,” will be held in the Hunt Library Auditorium, and a reception will immediately follow in Duke Energy Hall. Both the lecture and reception are free and open to the public; please register to reserve a seat: go.ncsu.edu/elkan-lecture-2017.

North Carolina State University’s Park Scholarships Class of 2017 will present the 18th annual William C. Friday Award to Thomas W. Ross, President of the Volcker Alliance and President Emeritus of the 17-campus University of North Carolina, on Monday, February 27 at 5:30 pm in NC State’s Hunt Library Auditorium. Ross will deliver a lecture immediately following the award presentation. The event is free and open to the public.

Following is one of 28 first-person alumni profiles that were compiled in a photo book for the Park Foundation Trustees in September 2016. Each alumnus was ask to share highlights of his or her path from receiving the Park Scholarship to the present day.

Following is one of 28 first-person alumni profiles that were compiled in a photo book for the Park Foundation Trustees in September 2016 and updated recently. Each alumnus was ask to share highlights of his or her path from receiving the Park Scholarship to the present day.

Sara Lane’s diverse professional experiences have led her all over the world. Now as coordinator of career services for NC State’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS), Lane ‘01 has come full circle, and her nonlinear career path also benefits the students with whom she interacts each day.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has selected 400 Semifinalists for the Class of 2021 – the 22nd class of Park Scholars. Candidates were selected from an exceptionally talented pool of nearly 2,150 applicants based on outstanding accomplishments and potential in scholarship, leadership, service, and character.

In October the Class of 2019 traveled to Washington, D.C. for the Learning Lab II experience, designed to allow sophomore Park Scholars to develop a critical understanding of a nationally-relevant topic by interacting with leaders immersed in that issue. The class chose to examine how leaders balance ethics and efficacy when navigating the relationships between political campaign organizations and the media—a particularly relevant topic in the context of the contentious 2016 presidential election.

NC State faculty have played a critical role in the Park Scholarships program since its inception 20 years ago, but few faculty members have been involved with the program as heavily or in as many ways as Dr. Gerald H. Elkan, professor emeritus of microbiology.

Following is one of 28 first-person alumni profiles that were compiled in a photo book for the Park Foundation Trustees in September 2016. Each alumnus was ask to share highlights of his or her path from receiving the Park Scholarship to the present day.

Following is one of 28 first-person alumni profiles that were compiled in a photo book for the Park Foundation Trustees in September 2016. Each alumnus was ask to share highlights of his or her path from receiving the Park Scholarship to the present day.

Following is one of 28 first-person alumni profiles that were compiled in a photo book for the Park Foundation Trustees in September 2016. Each alumnus was ask to share highlights of his or her path from receiving the Park Scholarship to the present day.

With hundreds of millions of users and one of the most iconic – and quirkily mercurial – logos, Google is among the world’s most familiar companies. Yet while many of us turn to Google search for information daily, few know its behind-the-scenes intricacies as well as Daniel Hoag ‘03. A software engineer at Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., he has dabbled in several of the company’s key initiatives.

In May, Morgan Barbre ‘19 and Cambray Smith ‘18 traveled to Copenhagen, Denmark as delegates to the fourth triennial Women Deliver global conference. With nearly 6,000 attendees representing more than 150 countries, this was the largest gathering on girls’ and women’s health and rights in the last decade.

Eric Scholz ‘12 believes in doing things for the right reasons. That’s why the former mechanical engineering major now owns an eponymous music production business specializing in the mixing and mastering of vocal and a cappella music.

Richa Patel ‘18 is the first recipient of the Jenny Chang Public Policy Endowment Award. Created to honor the memory of Jenny Chang ’00, this fund supports Park Scholars pursuing public policy internships or employment in Washington, D.C. Patel, an aerospace engineering and political science double major with her sights on a career in science and technology policy, spent this past summer in our nation’s capital interning with the State Department’s Office of the Science & Technology Adviser to the Secretary (STAS).

Many of the Park Scholarships programs’ strongest partnerships began with a single connection. One exemplar of this is the Park Scholars’ work with DKMS (formerly known as Delete Blood Cancer), an international nonprofit organization dedicated to the fight against blood cancer and blood disorders. DKMS strives to increase awareness, recruit bone marrow donors, and raise funds to cover the costs of adding new donors to the registry. Over the past three academic years, Park Scholars have supported DKMS’ efforts by registering nearly 600 bone marrow donors – five of whom have since been matched with patients and completed the stem cell or bone marrow donation.

Alex Loflin ‘17 discovered her love for environmental science and conservation through her participation in North Carolina Envirothon competitions during middle and high school. She came to NC State to pursue these passions with the goal of becoming an environmental educator within a park system, science museum, or nonprofit organization that would allow her to equip others to be environmental stewards. Loflin’s coursework as a natural resources major and extension education minor has not only developed her technical knowledge, but informed her understanding of how to share that knowledge and enact change on a community level.

Korey Hite has always enjoyed taking things apart to see how they work. As a young child he once unscrewed the timer from his family’s game of Scattergories to examine the springs and gears inside. His investigations became increasingly sophisticated as he grew older. An aficionado of Tinker Toys, Legos, Erector sets, and the video game Rollercoaster Tycoon, Hite became adept at not only disassembling objects and understanding their functionality, but improving on their design. So it was no surprise when, upon completing a lengthy interest inventory questionnaire in high school, Hite’s top two best career matches were semi-truck driver and mechanical engineer.

Richard “Memie” Ezike ‘05 can trace his interests in environmentalism and the public good back to a specific moment in his childhood. One day when he was 7 years old, he watched as a tractor trailer rumbled through the apartment complex where he lived in Johnson City, Tenn., spewing black smoke from its exhaust tailpipe. Contemplating the negative effects this “dirty smoke” had on the air he and his neighbors were breathing, Ezike knew he wanted to do something to curb this problem.

The Park Scholarships program is proud of its recent graduates in the Class of 2016. During their time at NC State, these newest additions to the Park alumni roster made a meaningful impact on campus and around the world through their scholarship, leadership, and service.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has named 40 students to its Class of 2020, and the 1000th Park Scholar – the first to be funded entirely by donors beyond the Park Foundation – will soon enroll at NC State.

James Kiwanuka-Tondo has served as one of two Chancellor-appointed Park Faculty Scholars for the graduating Class of 2016. In this role, he and his counterpart, Derek Aday, have guided their class in developing enrichment activities and advised individual students on academic matters. Kiwanuka-Tondo’s connection with the Park Scholarships program, however, began long before the Class of 2016 entered NC State.

This academic year, a Park Scholar and an alumna teamed up to develop a series of training videos for aspiring nutrition educators. Natalie Cooke ‘10, Postdoctoral Teaching Scholar in NC State’s Department of Food, Bioprocessing & Nutrition Sciences and Program Director for A PACKed Kitchen – a satellite of the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle – received a DELTA Exploratory Grant to investigate the feasibility of 360° videos in training and evaluation for a community nutrition service-learning course. Kati Scruggs ‘18, a dual major in applied nutrition and women’s and gender studies, served as a research assistant for the project.

Investigating possibilities, engaging in trial and error, cultivating relationships and resources: all are skills a researcher needs to be effective. With an eye to a career in academia, Evan Brooks ‘18 has been honing these skills since his high school days.

North Carolina State University’s Park Scholarships Class of 2016 presented the 17th annual William C. Friday Award to Joy Currey, founder and president of CORRAL Riding Academy, on Thursday, April 21 in NC State’s SAS Hall.

Park Scholars give back – this mindset is at the core of the program’s mission and culture. Park Scholars donate their time to charities at home and abroad, serve as community leaders, and strive to use their talents to benefit others.

As a Park Scholar at NC State, Leslie Scheunemann ‘01 had no shortage of interests. She triple-majored in physics, applied mathematics, and chemistry; minored in Japanese; conducted mentored research; studied ethics independently; gave piano recitals; practiced karate; and was engaged in community service. Not only did each of these pursuits help lay the groundwork for Scheunemann’s post-collegiate life and work, they made her feel connected to something larger than herself.

Logan ‘19 and Taylor ‘16 Graham, natives of the mountain town of Durango in rural southwestern Colorado, are the first sibling pair to hold membership in the Park Scholarships programs at NC State and Ithaca College, respectively. As the elder brother, Taylor was the first to make the move to the East Coast.

As a freshman beginning her NC State career, Jezzette Rivera ‘10 anticipated pursuing a career in politics, law, and/or the nonprofit sector. She majored in criminology and political science with a concentration in law and justice, spent the summer following her freshman year interning with the League of United Latin American Citizens, and served as a House Intern with the North Carolina General Assembly throughout her junior year and the subsequent summer.

Aerial robotics: for some, this concept likely conjures up images of R2D2 and C3PO walking on tightropes and swinging from trapezes. But for Daniel Mellinger ‘07, aerial robotics is a technology with unlimited potential. Mellinger has built a career on the development of tiny quadrotor helicopters, or “drones.” These vehicles have applications ranging from consumer aerial photography to entertainment, and can even fly discretely into otherwise inaccessible or dangerous environments to capture photos and other data about scenarios ranging from natural disasters to poachers of endangered wildlife.

When New Jersey native Leanne Nieforth ‘16 arrived at NC State four years ago as an animal science major, she aspired to attend the College of Veterinary Medicine and eventually become an equine surgeon. Eager to build research experience, as a freshman she began working in Dr. Jack Odle’s Laboratory of Developmental Nutrition alongside senior research associate Dr. Sheila Jacobi.

The following Park Scholars and Park Faculty Scholars have received media attention in recent weeks for their entrepreneurial ventures, anthropological breakthroughs, and commitment to regional dialect preservation:

Amanda Cannon ‘17 was the kind of high school student who was curious about everything. While one interest – the music industry – stood out among the rest, Cannon doubted its potential to evolve into a “real” career. While she began college in Exploratory Studies (formerly known as the First Year College), NC State’s home for freshmen undecided about a major, by the end of that first year, she declared a business administration major with a concentration in marketing.

As a high school student looking ahead to college, Ryan Thompson ‘06 planned to major in either mechanical or biomedical engineering. Upon touring the NC State campus, however, he happened upon the College of Textiles. There he learned about opportunities for integrating engineering applications with his passion for getting out into nature.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has selected 345 Semifinalists for the Class of 2020 – the twenty-first class of Park Scholars. Candidates were selected from an exceptionally talented pool of just over 2,000 applicants based on outstanding accomplishments and potential in scholarship, leadership, service, and character.

As a young college student who shadowed physicians while in high school, Shelly (Strickland) Lowery ‘04 was initially uncertain whether she wanted to pursue a career in medicine. She opted to double major in biomedical and biological engineering at NC State, believing these fields to be the best match for her love of mathematics and science as well as her tentative interest in medicine.

Several Park Scholars have received media attention in recent months for their work on entrepreneurial initiatives and causes ranging from medicine to girls’ empowerment, the environment, and affordable housing. Read on to learn how they’re positively impacting their communities.

While no two Park Scholars are alike, a commonality among them is multipotentiality: each scholar possesses strengths and interests in disparate areas. One manifestation of this trait is an eclectic set of academic and life experiences, and Win Bassett’s rather circuitous professional path exemplifies this.

For many Park Scholars, a key benefit of being part of this program community is having access to now 16 classes of alumni who are eager to offer advice regarding careers and graduate study. The Park Scholarships intranet, SPIFFY, is one forum through which alumni share job and internship leads and where scholars of all classes can make professional connections.

Imagine a toilet that uses concentrated sunlight to heat up human waste to temperatures upwards of 300°C and turn it into sterilized charcoal. As unconventional as it might sound, this “Sol-Char Toilet” was the basis of a Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation-funded project on which BJ Ward ‘09 spent most of her first year as a professional research associate with the University of Colorado (CU-Boulder).

Two days prior to the start of their junior year, the Class of 2017 took part in “Concepts and Models,” a half-day session that’s part of the Park Scholarships’ comprehensive Leadership Academy. Steve Barr and Paul Mulvey, professors in the Poole College of Management’s Department of Management, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship and former Park Faculty Scholars, led the session, which focused on self-awareness, personality, and communication styles.

In June 2014, Harrison Dudley ‘09 returned to NC State for a position as a clinical veterinarian in the College of Veterinary Medicine’s Department of Population Health and Pathobiology. Recently, he was re-hired into the role of clinical assistant professor of ruminant health management.

Josh Christie ‘02 currently serves as Vice President of Engineering for ChannelAdvisor, a global software company headquartered in Research Triangle Park, N.C. that provides cloud-based e-commerce solutions for retailers and manufacturers to manage and optimize their sales across online channels such as Amazon. He recently received a 2015 Triangle Business Journal 40 Under 40 Leadership Award. These awards recognize outstanding professionals under the age of 40 for their contributions to their organizations and to the community.

Lisa Bullard, a Park Faculty Scholar for the Class of 2018, has built her career at NC State on the foundation of a lifelong love for the university. A native of Garner, N.C., Bullard always wanted to attend NC State. She opted to study chemical engineering because she heard it was the most difficult major and “thought it sounded like a fun challenge.”

Park Scholars point to their peers – similarly ambitious and hard working individuals – among the most influential aspects of the Park experience. Synergies between scholars are at the core of campus-based initiatives like Service Raleigh, Triangle Youth Leadership Services, and the Krispy Kreme Challenge, but they also extend well beyond graduation. While Greg Mulholland ’07 and Jordan O’Mara ‘07 initially followed disparate paths after NC State, now they’re drawing upon one another’s strengths to build a potentially revolutionary startup company.

Licensed architect and LEED Accredited Professional Billy Askey ‘05 began contemplating a career in design as a high school student, when an art teacher pushed him to understand how creativity influences and contributes to our environment.

An eighth grade social studies and English/language arts teacher at Carroll Middle School in Raleigh, N.C., Jessie Jordan Hathcock ’11 is carrying on a family legacy in education. Her mother, who lost her battle with breast cancer when Hathcock was four years old, was a public school teacher. Hathcock grew up hearing stories of her mother’s positive impact on their community, and decided to major in middle grades education at NC State. She recently completed her fourth year of teaching.

Growing up, Khari Cyrus ‘16 always thought he would one day become an orthopedic surgeon. While that was his intent as a freshman human biology major entering NC State, it didn’t take long for Cyrus to realize his interests pointed somewhere other than medical school.

This year, the Park Scholarships program is proud to graduate the Class of 2015. Since they first arrived on campus in Fall 2011, these students have excelled as scholars, leaders, and in service to their communities. Their Wolfpack imprints can be seen across the globe – in the educational experience of students at an Ethiopian school, in re-built homes destroyed by fire in Chile, and even within the excavated walls of Petra, Jordan, one of the Seven Wonders of the World.

Four Park Scholars – Alex Brown ’17, Chandler Gonzales ’18, Alex Kim ’17, and Charan Mohan ’15 – were part of NC State’s delegation to this year’s Clinton Global Initiative University (CGI U), and attended the CGI U conference at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Fla. from March 6-8, 2015. The conference drew more than 1,100 students from 80 countries, as well as university representatives, topic experts, and celebrities. Participants discussed pressing global challenges, and how they’re taking concrete steps toward solving them.

Across North Carolina’s Triangle and Triad, Philip Boyne, Mollie Richardson Williams, and Jasmine Frantz are working to inspire the next generation of scholars and leaders. They are teaching more than physics, chemistry and math, respectively, as they bring the values learned as Park Scholars into the classroom.

Ricky Bloomfield’s undergraduate academic pursuits at NC State could point to any number of careers. With majors in chemistry and secondary education and minors in Spanish and saxophone performance, Bloomfield ’02 used his time as a Park Scholar to academically explore far and wide.

Reflecting on his career choice, Jon Clemmons ‘08, who earned an undergraduate degree in business administration with a concentration in finance, recalled a quote from baseball great Yogi Berra: “‘When you come to a fork in the road, take it.’”

On January 26, Kelleigh Smith joined NC State’s University Advancement team as director of development with a special focus on advancing the fundraising goals of both the Park Scholarships and Caldwell Fellows programs. Smith will provide direction for both programs’ comprehensive fundraising efforts, and is responsible for attracting major gifts from alumni, friends, industry, private foundations, and other philanthropic partners.

Akshay Iyer ’16, Sidhartha Jandhyala ’16, and Charan Mohan ’15 are brothers of the South Asian interest fraternity Delta Sigma Iota, which recently hosted six a cappella vocal ensembles from universities across the country to compete for the first annual Sangeet Saagar title.

From the Sarteneja Peninsula in Belize to the coastal city of Perth, Australia, Stephanie Wenclawski ‘16 has demonstrated her commitment to the study of marine sciences. Her international volunteer work with oceanic wildlife coupled with outreach efforts as both a Park Scholarships and University Ambassador have already primed Wenclawski to be a leader in her field.

In an opinion piece for the August 11, 2014 issue of Space News, Zack Hester ‘11 wrote, “While a manned Moon landing or an ambitious attempt at a first Mars landing would bring tremendous prestige to China, current human and robotic endeavors have brought sufficient world standing to China as a space power and serve its geopolitical objectives.”

Lindsey Robinson ‘08 has had a longstanding interest in helping others through science. This passion, coupled with an undergraduate degree in chemical and biomolecular engineering, has propelled her to conduct groundbreaking work in the pharmaceutical industry.

Jalen Feaster ‘16, an industrial and systems engineering major who aspires to work in the media industry, has pursued numerous opportunities to gain valuable professional experience and develop connections with leaders in field.

Although Park Scholars’ backgrounds and interests are widely varied, many alumni have found a home at Deloitte. Deloitte provides audit, tax, consulting, enterprise risk, and financial advisory services for many of the largest companies in the world, including many of the Fortune 500.

It goes without saying that many authors follow unorthodox paths in life, not necessarily beginning in writing. J.K. Rowling was working for Amnesty International when she came up with the idea of boy-wizard Harry Potter. Diary of a Wimpy Kid author Jeff Kinney dreamed of being a newspaper cartoonist. Even Maurice Sendak, who famously penned Where the Wild Things Are, spent several years illustrating children’s books before he began writing his own.

In April 2014, what has become known as “The Great Fire of Valparaíso” broke out in Chile. Almost 3,000 homes along the city’s hillsides were ravaged and more than 10,000 people became displaced over the course of a few days.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has selected 292 Semifinalists for the Class of 2019 – the twentieth class of Park Scholars. Candidates were selected from an exceptionally talented pool of nearly 1,800 applicants based on outstanding accomplishments and potential in scholarship, leadership, service, and character.

Scholarship. Leadership. Service. Character. The four pillars on which the Park Scholarships program is founded are also at the core of the U.S. armed forces’ mission – and more than one Park alumnus currently serving our country has remarked on this parallel. In recognition of Veterans Day, we asked six service men and women with shared roots as Park Scholars to shed light on why they chose to join the armed forces, what advice they would offer those who are considering military service, and how their NC State experiences have influenced their post-graduation endeavors.

We are grateful to these fine individuals and to all who serve and protect our nation.

Career-savvy college graduates recognize that one must embrace both challenges and opportunities to achieve professional fulfillment. One such young alumnus was Daniel Malechuk ‘03, who graduated with a business management major and a Spanish minor and has spent the past eleven years clambering up the corporate ladder. Promoted from district manager to director of corporate purchasing for ALDI, Inc., Malechuk has served as vice president of international sales for Keysource Foods since January 2011.

At the age of 14, Mark DeMaria ’17 developed a fascination with the merging of computers and design, hybridizing the technical and the creative. This fascination, though, was never of the spectator variety. After a few years of years of experimentation and self-teaching, it has evolved into a passion.

In an increasingly interconnected world, we look to the innovative thinkers and technology developers to solve some of our most pervasive problems. Joy Johnson ’07 is one of these technological innovators. From her years as an undergraduate at NC State to her current research at MIT, she has been using her skill set to take inventive projects to the next level.

The Learning Lab II experience is designed to allow sophomore Park Scholars to develop a critical understanding of a national issue – selected by the class during their freshman year – by interacting with leaders immersed in that issue. In October the Class of 2017 traveled to Washington, D.C. to examine how leaders in the public and private sectors tackle complex challenges surrounding the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) from both domestic and international perspectives.

North Carolina State University’s Park Scholarships Class of 2015 will present the 16th annual William C. Friday Award to behavioral economist Dan Ariely. The award presentation is open to the public and will be held on Monday, November 17 at 5:30 PM at NC State’s Talley Student Union.

Retreats are integral components of the Park Scholarships experience. The Freshman Retreat serves to welcome new scholars into the community by affording them opportunities to get to know one another, the program itself, Park Faculty Scholars and staff, and the upperclassmen who facilitate small group discussion throughout the three-day period.

Kristin Murphy, global competitive sales intelligence manager for SAS Institute and an alumna of NC State, has been actively involved with the Park Scholarships program for the past four years. At present she serves on three committees for the Park Scholarships program: the Advisory Committee, which provides important counsel to the director on the scholars’ academic enrichment activities; the Service Advisory Committee, which offers guidance to the staff in planning and evaluating scholars’ Civic Engagement Initiatives; and the Selection Committee, in which capacity she conducts Finalist interviews.

In a survey of recent Park Scholarships graduates, nearly 90% of respondents reported having had at least one international experience over the course of their undergraduate years – whether study abroad, research, a professional conference, an internship, service, or an alternative pursuit. Dr. Jere Confrey and Dr. Alan Maloney, parents of Tyler Confrey-Maloney ‘13, are among those who have observed the impact of international experiences on students’ professional and personal growth and broadened perspectives.

As freshmen, Park Scholars participate in a weekly seminar that introduces topics related to leadership and service, and exposes students to the diversity of NC State’s academic offerings and other resources. The seminar also provides a framework for how different disciplines approach problem solving.

Derek Aday serves as one of two Chancellor-appointed Park Faculty Scholars for the Class of 2016. In this role, he and his counterpart, James Kiwanuka-Tondo, guide their class in developing enrichment activities and advise individual students on academic matters.

While many are celebrating America’s Independence Day with cookouts and fireworks, Kathleen “Kat” Griffin ‘11 will board a plane bound for South Korea. The recipient of a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant (ETA) grant, Griffin will spend the next year living with a host family and teaching English in a public, secondary school in an as-yet-unassigned South Korean city.

Shaunis Mercer ’02 explored several majors before landing in NC State’s College of Management, where she completed a degree in business management. Although she concentrated in human resource management, Mercer said she enjoyed the diverse curriculum the college offered. Years later, when starting her own law firm, and in her current role overseeing juvenile defenders, she fully realized the value of her undergraduate coursework.

Park graduates Sudeep Sunthankar ‘12 and John Yanik ‘12, along with four collaborators, recently published a patent on “Implantation tools for spinal cord stimulator leads and related methods” – affectionately known by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as US 20130289685 A1.

The Park Scholarships program is proud of its recent graduates in the Class of 2014. These newest additions to the Park alumni roster have dedicated themselves to improving society through scholarship, leadership, and service.

As a high school senior with excellent test scores and top grades, Karli Moore faced a tough choice when it came time to pick a college. It didn’t help that she was accepted by every institution she applied to, including Ivy League schools Harvard and Dartmouth.

Learning Lab I is an annual experience designed and implemented by first-year Park Scholars. This educational program affords students an opportunity to learn about leadership by understanding the people, history, strengths, and challenges of North Carolina through the context of a theme selected by the class.

Being both a Division I athlete and a Park Scholar could be daunting for a freshman, but not for varsity cheerleader Mikayla Raleigh ’17. A young master of the art of time management, Raleigh is making the most of her collegiate experience.

During her time at NC State, Jessica Hooks ‘03 volunteered a minimum of 16 hours per month as a crisis hotline operator. This experience afforded her perspective on the range of issues with which individuals from all walks of life must learn to cope, and heightened her interest in community wellness.

Remy Roque ‘06 is about to graduate from medical school and begin his career as an anesthesiologist, but like many students, as he was growing up he didn’t always have a clear view of his future career.

Vance Whitaker ‘03, an assistant professor at the University of Florida, graduated from NC State with degrees in horticultural science and agricultural business management. He now has what might be the sweetest job on earth: he breeds strawberries.

North Carolina State University’s Park Scholarships Class of 2014 will present the 15th annual William C. Friday Award to Mr. Jim Whitehurst, president and CEO of Red Hat, the world’s leading provider of open source enterprise software.

Two recent Park alumni, Mary Charles Hale ‘13 and Alyson Harding ’13, have spent the past several months participating in AmeriCorps, a federal government-run program which provides services in nonprofit organizations, schools, public agencies, and community and faith-based groups across the country. We caught up with them to find out about their experiences as AmeriCorps members working with two very different program communities.

Sitting in her guidance counselor’s office, high school senior and star athlete Georgia Davis Brown ‘06 looked over the blank application before her – and slid it back across the desk to her counselor, incredulous that she had what it took to be selected for a Park Scholarship.

Meagan Gentry ’14 is participating in an internship with the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in Research Triangle Park, N.C. She works with a group in the Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards on the continued development of statistical mapping software, BenMAP, which is used for modeling and monitoring the effects of air quality policy changes.

Jeremy Diner says the highlight of his undergraduate career at NC State was learning about some of the world’s biggest problems and, as an Environmental Technology major, gaining hands-on skills that could solve these problems. His academic advisor, Dr. Robert Bruck, inspired Diner to pursue the path of an environmentalist.

Emily Scotton ‘15 recently completed an internship with the FaithAction International House in Greensboro, N.C., which aims to help Greensboro become a multicultural, immigrant-accepting city. Scotton assisted local immigrants with language skills and day-to-day resources.

Tomás Carbonell ’02 plays an important role in the well-being of our environment. While many people are satisfied with turning off the lights upon leaving a room, or taking the time to separate recyclables into the proper bins, Carbonell’s position with the Washington, D.C. office of the Environmental Defense Fund puts him on the front lines of clean air legislation.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has selected 286 Semifinalists for the Class of 2018. Candidates were selected from a talented pool of nearly 1,700 applicants based on outstanding accomplishments and potential in scholarship, leadership, service, and character.

The Park Scholarship is the highest academic and leadership award at N.C. State, and a magnet for top high school students from across the country. For Womble Carlyle attorneys Matt Latrick, Larry Moye and Kim Richards, the Park Scholarship also was a launching pad for their current legal careers.

Jacob Rutz ’14 has a passion for soil. He aspires to be both a farmer and a community food organizer in the future, and wants to teach others about creating global sustainability and organic farming processes. Rutz was able to combine these passions by joining the Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms (WWOOF) program in two locations in South Africa this past summer.

During her time at NC State, where she completed an undergraduate degree in biological sciences in 2008, Anna Shope’s roles as a Park Scholar, member of Phi Beta Kappa, and philanthropy chair of Delta Zeta sorority cultivated her commitment to service. Reflecting on this period, she remarks, “My Park Scholarships experience has shown me how to be an independent, free-thinking, effective leader.”

Whether known as GRASPs (Grants for Research, Artistic & Service Projects) or, in more recent years, as PEGs (Park Enrichment Grants), enrichment grant funding has aided hundreds of Park Scholars in pursuing professional and personal experiences that fostered their development in scholarship, service, leadership, and character. These funds, established in 1998, have provided support for scholars to launch new leadership and service initiatives at NC State and in the larger community, participate in internships and conferences, and study in locations throughout the world, among other endeavors.

Each summer Park Scholars are given the opportunity to explore the world of medicine through the Brody-Park internship. The internship, coordinated by the Park Scholarships program, allows students to shadow physicians, residents, and medical students at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University. Internship participants receive funding through the Park Enrichment Grant program.

Justin Hills ‘14 recently completed the Pediatric Oncology Education (POE) program at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn. The eleven-week program affords the opportunity for sixty students from across the country to interact with scientists and physicians in their related departments. As a senior in biology with a concentration in human biology, Hills plans to attend medical school after graduation.

“A bird doesn’t sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.” – Maya Angelou

Allison Nolker ‘13 is currently a master’s student at NC State studying zoology with concentrations in anthrozoology and bioacoustics. Nolker, who has had a lifelong interest in animals and human-animal interactions, piloted the accelerated dual bachelor’s/master’s program in zoology.

The next time you find yourself paging through a fashion magazine – or if you happen to be in New York City for Fashion Week – keep your eyes open for the work of Charles Harbison ’04, who recently launched his Fall/Winter 2013 debut collection.

As an undergraduate, Kayla Anderson ‘09 recognized that her experiences as a leader of the NC State dance team taught her strength and provided her with the opportunity to do what she loved while making friends and contacts. What she did not envision at that point was how her interest in dance would later evolve into a career.

There is a modern adage that many students who are entering college today will graduate into jobs that don’t exist yet. The same could be said of Ben Darnell who, subsequent to completing his undergraduate degree in computer science from NC State in 2002, launched his career at Google – a company that was founded mere weeks after Darnell began college in 1998.

When Tommy Vitolo ‘00 is not identifying opportunities to reduce air pollution, carbon emissions, and electricity bills as an associate for Synapse Energy Economics, he’s writing legislation for local government to use green cleaning products and prohibit the sale of tobacco on educational campuses in his role as a Brookline Town Meeting member.

Neal Robbins ‘01 admits he has always chosen the path that seemed the most rigorous. That path has taken him from work as a manufacturing engineer to a position with Governor Pat McCrory’s administration.

As I sit here in my typical spot aboard the MV Explorer, I am reflecting on the last and most recent port of Morocco. It is hard to believe that this journey is near its end. It has provided me an extraordinary opportunity to travel all around the world with some of the most incredible people I have ever met in my life.

The Class of 2016 met with individuals in Boone, Pittsboro, and Raleigh to gain a deeper understanding of leadership through exploring the theme of energy innovation in North Carolina. Students interacted with leaders across the state currently involved with developing conventional and alternative energy solutions.

Michele Tam ‘00 believes in giving back. As a member of the first graduating class of Park Scholars, Tam feels it is her duty to assist in finding the best candidates for the scholarship, a process that gets more competitive each year. Her continuing efforts with Park Scholarships have allowed her to stay connected with the program even though she now lives in Chicago.

A total of 1,600 University and community volunteers registered to participate in the annual Service Raleigh event. They began the day with a celebration on the NC State campus, where Raleigh City Councilmember Russ Stephenson and NC State Student Body President Andy Walsh delivered opening remarks.

Habitat for Humanity of Wake County staff member Missy Hatley clearly remembers the day last year when she was contacted by Richard Deans ‘13, chair of the Class of 2013 legacy committee. Deans explained that his class planned to raise $35,000 to help a family build a home in the Triangle.

The Class of 2016 participated in the 28th annual Emerging Issues Forum at the Raleigh Convention Center. This year’s theme focused on the next phase of manufacturing in North Carolina — a creative and innovative industry featuring advances such as 3-D printers.

What started as a dare between friends in 2004 has grown into one of the largest annual events at North Carolina State University, drawing thousands of competitors to Raleigh each year. The 2013 Krispy Kreme Challenge involved a record 8,000 runners and raised over $170,000.

To be successful in a company like Red Hat, the world’s leading provider of open source technology, one needs passion, and neither Jordan O’Mara ‘07 nor Jason Wong ‘06 is short on that. The two Park Scholar alumni have done very well in pursuing their passions for intellectual property and communications.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University named 105 Finalists for the Class of 2017.

Approximately 200 NC State alumni who comprise the Park Scholarships Selection Committee conducted interviews for 264 Semifinalists in early January. The Semifinalists were chosen from a record number of over 1,600 applicants.

The Park Scholarships program at North Carolina State University has selected 264 semifinalists for the Class of 2017. Candidates were selected from a talented pool of over 1600 applicants based on the four foundations of the program: scholarship, leadership, service, and character.

Caroline Ellington ‘13 recently completed a research internship in Aachen, Germany. The internship, sponsored by UROP International, consisted of 40 students from the United States and Canada and involved individual research projects and intensive German language instruction. As a senior in textile engineering with a concentration in product development, Ellington developed biocomposite yarns from renewable, raw materials.

Though most are familiar with the ancient city of Petra’s magnificent temples, tomb facades, and Byzantine churches, little is known about the ordinary citizens of Petra. As part of a team of students and archeologists, Caiti Cremer ‘15 set out to discover more.

Donny Katz ‘07 is a man on the move, but it’s more for our benefit than his own. Katz has a passion for getting people where they need to be safely and efficiently. He recently completed his Ph.D. in civil engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and his previous role as a research assistant had him analyzing the effects of airline depeaking at hub airports.

Deb Kull’s reach has been felt from as far away as Malawi and as close as here in the Triangle. As a development officer with the California-based Global AIDS Interfaith Alliance (GAIA), Kull organizes fundraising efforts for HIV/AIDS work and related activities to enhance the lives of people in Malawi.

The Class of 2015 visited Washington, D.C. to explore the impact that an average citizen can have on policy-making decisions at the federal level. Through focusing on areas including the media, advocacy, and the legislative process, students gained a deeper understanding of how citizens can influence their government.

The Park Scholarships community joins many around the state and nation in mourning the loss of one of the program’s first and most loyal friends, William C. Friday, who passed away on October 12. Friday served as president of the University of North Carolina system for 30 years, and he later played a key role in the founding of the Park Scholarships.

Carl Smith ‘16 distinctly remembers his first video game. What intrigued Smith most about The Simpsons Road Rage game was the fact that it featured a nuclear power plant. After learning about how nuclear plants generate significant amounts of electricity, Smith became fascinated by radiation and all of its properties — at the age of eight.

Margaret Leak ‘15 spent her summer a significant distance away from her home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She traveled to the thriving city of Addis Ababa to teach math to Ethiopian students through the nonprofit organization Cherokee Gives Back.

Cory Blankenship ‘07 is deeply connected to his roots as a Cherokee. As a member of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, Blankenship oversees the management of the Office of the Treasurer, including the departments of revenue, disbursements, investments, and risk management for the Tribal Government.

Brandon Carlisle ‘13 is second co-author of a paper published in the journal Analytical Chemistry. An abstract of “Systematic Comparison of Reverse Phase and Hydrophilic Interaction Liquid Chromatography Platforms for the Analysis of N-linked Glycans” by Walker SH, Carlisle BC, and Muddiman DC, can be found on PubMed, among other databases.

The Park Alumni Society (PAS) welcomed nearly 100 alumni back to NC State for the inaugural Park Alumni Reunion. Alumni traveled from locations such as California, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Texas to attend the weekend.

Brandon Buskey ‘02, a former assistant attorney general in the Civil Rights Bureau in the Office of the New York State Attorney General, believes his experience as a Park Scholar at NC State contributed to both his professional and personal success.

The Class of 2013 traveled to Rocky Mountain National Park this fall for their senior retreat. The seniors participated in thought-provoking activities that addressed the transition from their roles as Park Scholars to alumni. Discussions incorporated topics such as making contributions to their communities and maintaining connections with the program and NC State.

“I watched a dear friend of my family fight melanoma for six years,” says Hayley Stowe ‘14. “That experience shaped my goal to be an oncologist and make a difference in the lives of people battling cancer.”

Stowe, a biological sciences major with a concentration in human biology, traveled to El Remate, Guatemala during her first year at NC State. While working in a medical clinic on an alternative service break trip sponsored by the Center for Student Leadership, Ethics, and Public Service, Stowe met a local medicine woman named Doña Maria. Doña Maria spends her time traveling throughout the country introducing Guatemalans to herbal remedies to combat a host of illnesses. This trip to Central America reinforced Stowe’s desire to enter the world of medicine.

Alyson Harding ‘13 has taken full advantage of her summers since becoming a Park Scholar.

Harding recently returned from Micronesia where she participated in the Island Archaeology Program. While in Palau, she worked with a team to conduct an archaeological dig at a cemetery on the Rock Islands. The site, known as Chelechol ra Orrak, is approximately 3,000 years old and is one of the oldest known cemeteries in the Pacific Islands. Harding’s daily responsibilities included organizing the lab, wet screening in the field, and excavating trenches. Information gathered from Chelechol ra Orrak is fundamental to understanding the lives of the Pacific Islands’ earliest residents.

According to the National Center for Education Statistics, the number of students enrolled in public charter schools more than tripled from 340,000 to 1.4 million between 1999 and 2009. During that period, the percentage of charter schools that were high-poverty schools increased from 13 to 30 percent.

As a professor in the Joint Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University, Roger Narayan has built a career based on medical applications research while guiding his students to advance the field of engineering.

Kristoph Kleiner ‘09 is spending his summer as one of three doctoral research interns with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Kleiner’s responsibilities include conducting independent research, holding seminars for other research economists, and writing reports for economists on various statistical analyses.

Anne Watson ‘12 has been investigating how certain organic materials play a role in devices including solar cells and transistors. Funded by a Park Enrichment Grant this past spring, Watson has been able to examine a system of locally constructed thin-film transistors composed of all-polymer materials that are cost-effective and environmentally friendly.

Lianne Gonsalves ‘10 has received a David L. Boren Fellowship which will fund a year in Ethiopia. During her time in Africa, Gonsalves will immerse herself in language acquisition and a qualitative research project.

Two years ago, Sonya Patel ‘09 traveled to the West Bank for a month following her first year at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine. Patel was part of a team of international medical students selected to participate in the Refugee Camp Project.

Alyse Flick ‘13 was recently awarded the Mathews Medal, the highest non-academic distinction presented to students who have made significant contributions to NC State University throughout their undergraduate career.

Garnered by his commitment to disband misconceptions about public health and promote knowledge in that field, Justin Hills ‘14, a biological sciences major with a concentration in human biology, has been named a participant of the Minority Health International Research Training (MHIRT) Program. Hills will spend 12 weeks this summer in Kumasi, Ghana through the MHIRT Program.

Learning Laboratory I is an experience that allows Park Scholars to study leadership through the exploration of an issue facing the state of North Carolina.

The Class of 2015 traveled to sites in Chatham, Surry, and Wake Counties to learn about the impact community colleges and small businesses have on North Carolina in the areas of economic and environmental sustainability, along with the challenges that leaders in these areas are facing.

As an environmental engineering major, Dylan Cawthorne ‘14 knows he would like to like to work with an engineering consulting firm after graduation. However, he has yet to decide if he wants that job to be on the technical or policy side of environmental engineering. Cawthorne is also uncertain if he wants to focus on promoting sustainability in water consumption, waste flow, or renewable energy sources.

According to the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), 65,000 of Ukraine’s 9 million children live in orphanages, shelters, and boarding schools run by the government. Over the last decade, the number of children living in Ukrainian institutions has doubled; this high rate of child abandonment is attributed to factors such as poverty, unemployment, and substance abuse.

Brian Gaudio ‘13 and Kyle Thompson ‘13 were among four NC State students to win first place and best of show awards at the Walt Disney Imagineering ImagiNations Design Competition in February. Now in its 21st year, ImagiNations is a competition created by Walt Disney Imagineering to promote careers in creative fields and provide university students with the opportunity to gain design experience.

On a brisk Saturday morning in February, a record 7,700 participants took part in the Krispy Kreme Challenge — an event that included runners from as far away as Australia. The race raised more than $100,000 to benefit the North Carolina Children’s Hospital.

Jasmine Flood ‘12 was among a select group of upcoming designers awarded the Geoffrey Beene National Scholarship at the Young Menswear Association Fashion Scholarship Fund awards dinner at the Waldorf Astoria in New York earlier this year.

The Class of 2014 spent their fall break in Washington, D.C. analyzing the media’s impact on the dissemination of information in the United States. In light of events such as the WikiLeaks scandal and the national healthcare debate, the class was interested in exploring the responsibility assumed by the media in providing news to the American public.

Whenever Kathleen Powers ‘05 used to introduce herself as someone who worked in the tax field, she inevitably received a barrage of questions about personal income tax returns. Ironically, the former PricewaterhouseCoopers tax manager has never even completed her own tax return; however, she has audited the books of countless corporations over the course of her career in Switzerland.

With the support of a Park Enrichment Grant, Rachel Turner ‘12 attended the 10th Annual International Colic Research Symposium in Indianapolis where her research on colic recovery was presented by Dr. Matthew Gerard, a clinical associate professor of large animal surgery in the NC State University College of Veterinary Medicine.

John Griggs has been a faculty member at NC State University for over two decades and currently serves as a teaching assistant professor and coordinator of classroom instruction in the Department of Mathematics. Along with Juliana Nfah-Abbenyi, a professor in the Department of English, Griggs serves as a Park Faculty Scholar for the Class of 2013.

Brian Ferris ‘03 was one of a select group of Americans to be named a Champion of Change in the area of technology and innovation by the White House. Ferris received this recognition for his work with open-source software and public transportation systems.

After meeting Pastor Leon Dorleans, field director of Haiti Outreach Ministries, during a campus talk on post-earthquake relief efforts in Haiti sponsored by the University Scholars Program, Krystal Smith ‘14 immediately decided she was going to spend her summer making a difference.

After living through over half a dozen major hurricanes while growing up in Hawaii and North Carolina, Travis Miles ‘07 decided he wanted to spend his life exploring the atmosphere and the oceans. This past year, Miles spent several months in Antarctica to investigate how climate change impacts ecosystems on the frozen continent.

Despite the fact that his grandfather cautioned him against mixing religion and politics, John Coggin ‘09 recently graduated from Harvard University with a Master of Theological Studies in Religion, Ethics, and Politics.

Eva Holcomb ‘02 was elected president of the Undergraduate Scholars Program Administrators Association (USPAA) at the group’s recent fifth annual meeting. Holcomb will serve a two-year term as president.

The US-UK Fulbright Commission has announced that Alyssa D’Addezio ‘14 will participate in a Fulbright Summer Institute at Newcastle University. During the five-week program in England, D’Addezio will explore the culture, heritage, and history of the United Kingdom, while developing research and communication skills.

After growing up on a dairy farm in Caswell County, Sara Lane ‘01 now finds herself nearly 8,000 miles away from home in eastern Africa. Along the way, Lane completed degrees in agricultural business management and agricultural extension as a Park Scholar at NC State. She went on to pursue a master’s degree in broadcast journalism at the University of Missouri-Columbia. Lane later worked as a producer with CNN until she decided to trade her office in New York for more modest surroundings in rural Malawi.

Kelly Cox ‘13, Josh Knight ‘13, and John Miller ‘13 have spent the better part of the last year turning an idea into a reality. In the process, the students landed sponsors, applied for status as a nonprofit organization, and recruited students to play in the inaugural Red and White Soccer Classic tournament they organized this spring – all in the name of cancer research.

On Friday, May 6, the NC State Belltower will be bathed in red to celebrate the recent accomplishments of Park Scholar and University Honors Program student Garik Sadovy ‘12. Sadovy was named a recipient of the David L. Boren Scholarship by the National Security Education Program (NSEP) and the Morris K. Udall Scholarship by the Udall Foundation.

North Carolina State University is pleased to announce that 45 exceptional young women and men have been named to the Park Scholarships Class of 2015. The sixteenth class of Park Scholars was selected from over 1,300 applicants by the Park Scholarships Selection Committee, comprised of more than 200 Park Scholar and NC State alumni from across the country.

During spring break, Ryan Nilsen ‘09 and Bryan Lopez ‘13 worked with former Associate Vice Chancellor and Director of Student Health Services Jerry Barker to lead a University Scholars Program experience to Arizona and Mexico where students learned about border and immigration issues. Through a combination of backpacking in Saguaro National Park and conversations with people whose lives and work are shaped by the realities of our current immigration system, the group gained a deeper understanding of the human and legal complexities of life on the border.

Gerry Elkan received his Ph.D. in microbiology from Virginia Tech and joined the NC State University faculty in 1958. While he technically retired from NC State in 1994, Elkan has remained extremely active in the areas of teaching, research, and mentoring.

Approximately 2,000 students, alumni, and community members took part in Service Raleigh this spring. The one-day service initiative allows participants to serve their community and encourages individuals to continue volunteering throughout the year.

Now in its 14th year, Service Raleigh was responsible for generating over 6,000 hours of community service to benefit residents of the greater Wake County area.

The Udall Foundation is pleased to announce that 80 students from 61 colleges and universities have been selected as 2011 Udall Scholars. Among them is Garik Sadovy ‘12 from Wake Forest, North Carolina. Sadovy is working towards a major in materials science and engineering and a minor in environmental science. He is a Park Scholar and a member of the University Honors Program. Sadovy serves as president of Tau Beta Pi, a national professional engineering society.

Thousands of women from around the world recently gathered at the United Nations (UN) to engage in a dialogue on the status of women, and Katie Starr ‘11 was among them. While in New York, Starr presented her research on the sex trafficking of women and girls in the state of North Carolina as a delegate of the 55th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW).

While at NC State, Greenville, North Carolina native Marycobb Randall ‘12 has excelled in her studies in the Poole College of Management and has had a significant impact on campus during her time as an undergraduate.

Chris Carr ‘12 recently presented a paper entitled Autism Candidate Genes via Mouse Phenomics at the 2011 AMIA Summit on Translational Bioinformatics (TBI 2011) in San Francisco, California. The summit involved a range of lectures and panels that highlighted the latest developments in biomedical informatics research and clinical care. Carr’s submission was selected as one of the top for TBI 2011, and is eligible for inclusion as an open-access publication in the Journal of Biomedical Informatics.

Jocelyn DeVance Taliaferro is one of two Park Faculty Scholars for the Class of 2014. She provides guidance for the class along with her colleague Jim Martin, a professor in the Department of Chemistry. The faculty members were selected by the chancellor to work with the class during their four years at NC State University.

Vinnie Feucht ‘11 is the recipient of a scholarship to participate in ThinkImpact’s Innovation Institute this summer in Africa. The Innovation Institute is an opportunity for students to live in rural African communities, learn about social entrepreneurship, and work collaboratively with community members to develop social products and services that can be managed and sustained locally.

After graduating from NC State with a degree in physics, Ryan Neely ‘09 headed west to pursue his next degree. As the Earth System Research Laboratory – Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (ESRL/CIRES) graduate fellow at the University of Colorado at Boulder, Neely is pursuing his Ph.D. in atmospheric and oceanic science. CIRES is a joint institute of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the university.

NC State University has named 105 Finalists for the Park Scholarships Class of 2015. These Finalists were selected following a review of more than 1,300 applications and interviews with a select group of Semifinalists in January.

Over 70 high school students from across North Carolina took part in the second annual Triangle Youth Leadership Conference on the NC State University campus in November. Participants explored the topic of leadership through an array of sessions that ranged from small group discussions to workshops facilitated by NC State students.

Running a marathon has been on Katie Starr’s bucket list ever since she became passionate about long distance races during her first year at NC State. As a member of Team Liberty, Starr recently completed her first marathon in Philadelphia where she ran to benefit the nonprofit organization Liberty Resources.

Bob Grossfeld is one of two faculty members appointed by the chancellor to serve as a Park Faculty Scholar for the Class of 2012. He works with Dr. Steve Barr, a professor in the Department of Management, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship, to provide guidance for class enrichment activities and advise individual students on academic matters.

The 125,000 members of the Health Occupations Students of America (HOSA) have a new national president – Claire Lucas ‘13, an industrial engineering major at NC State University. Lucas has already met with Surgeon General Regina Benjamin, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, and Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) to discuss health care issues – and she is only getting started.

Nicole Mack ‘11, a senior in mathematics education and statistics, recently spent a semester abroad studying in Ghana, the country of her ancestors. Her goal for the semester was to personally experience Ghanaian customs and culture, so that she could draw her own conclusions about what it means to be African.

Juliana Nfah-Abbenyi and John Griggs were appointed by the chancellor to serve as Park Faculty Scholars for the Class of 2013. In this role, the faculty oversee enrichment activities for the class and provide academic guidance for individual students.

Each fall, the sophomore class of Park Scholars travels to Washington, D.C. to study a leadership challenge facing our country. This year, the Class of 2013 focused on national education reform in the wake of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, reauthorized in 2001 as the No Child Left Behind Act.

Tyler Confrey-Maloney ‘13 spent his summer living in a Shangaan village in South Africa as a global development intern for the nonprofit organization ThinkImpact. Interns with the organization serve as catalysts and business advisors for local entrepreneurs.

As part of her problem-based learning curriculum in the M.D. Program for Integrated Learning at the Drexel University College of Medicine, Meghan Craven ‘09 was required to gain practical experience by working with a primary care physician for six weeks. She needed to look no further than fellow Park alumna Theresa Amerson ‘01, an internist at Boylan Medical Associates in Raleigh.

Jasmine Flood ‘12 spent her summer working as an art instructor for the City of Greenville’s Famous Artists Camp. Her duties included coordinating creative projects influenced by well-known artists and art movements for children ranging in age from 5-13.

Drew Boyuka ‘11 spent his summer in Beijing at the Microsoft Research Asia lab. While in China, he worked on distributed query processing and scheduling in a cloud-computing environment designed to improve the efficiency of large data centers such as those affiliated with Microsoft, Google, and Amazon.

Luke Zettlemoyer ‘00 joined the faculty in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington this fall. In addition to his teaching responsibilities, Zettlemoyer will continue his research on artificial intelligence.

Caldwell Fellow Kevin Miller (‘13) and Park Scholars Brian Gaudio (‘13), Alex Lombardi (‘13), and Claire Lucas (‘13) joined NC State students Drew Brisley (‘12) and Caitlin McCombs (‘13), along with members of the Raleigh community in collecting more than 2,000 pairs of shoes in conjunction with Soles4Souls, a nonprofit organization that coordinates shoe distribution to those in need around the world…

Katie Starr ‘11 spent her summer learning about local government as an intern in the office of the mayor of Change, France. The mayor’s office was located in the town hall, an institution that functions as the most decentralized form of government for French citizens.

As a program coordinator for Operation Smile, Lauren Wall ‘08 organizes medical missions in developing countries to provide children with free surgeries to treat facial deformities, such as cleft palate and cleft lip. Although her primary territory includes Brazil, Venezuela, and Ecuador, Wall’s work has recently taken her to India and Bolivia.

Bryan Peele ‘12 is passionate about using his mechanical engineering training to serve others. During his first semester at NC State, Peele began undergraduate research with his Park Faculty Mentor, Dr. Richard Gould, Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, to create a solar-powered cooler to transport vaccines in developing countries.

He went on to spend a summer at the University of Hawaii at Manoa through the National Science Foundation’s Research Experiences for Undergraduates program, where he worked with researchers to develop a computational model that predicts the effect of storm surges on shipping containers.

Clifford Griffin, a University of Rochester Ph.D. and a former National Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, is an associate professor of political science in the School of Public and International Affairs and a Park Faculty Scholar for the Class of 2011.

This fall, the fifteenth class of Park Scholars arrived on campus at NC State University. The class was selected from over 1,300 individuals who submitted their applications by last year’s November 1 deadline. Over 200 Park Scholarships and NC State alumni, faculty, and friends of the program participated in the selection process.

Andre Waschka ‘13 has spent the last two summers working with landmine victims in the Croatian town of Rovini on the Adriatic coast. The camp, coordinated by the Norwegian People’s Aid Foundation and the U.S. Department of State, provides activities designed to boost self-esteem, expose children to cultural and athletic opportunities, and introduce participants to others who experience similar physical and psychological problems.

Garik Sadovy ‘12 took the stage at Carnegie Hall this summer and sang bass as a guest performer with the choir Resounding Harmony. His performance was part of an event entitled Sing for the Cure – a joint project involving Susan G. Komen for the Cure and the Turtle Creek Chorale.

Earlier this summer, the U.S. Department of State and the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board announced that Lianne Gonsalves ‘10 was awarded a Fulbright English Teaching Assistantship to Venezuela. Gonsalves is one of over 1,500 American citizens who will travel abroad for the 2010-2011 academic year through the Fulbright U.S. Student Program.

As Hurricane Alex prepares to make landfall along the coasts of Mexico and Texas, waves created by the storm are making Gulf cleanup efforts even more difficult for U.S. Coast Guard Ensign Cameron Cooper ‘09 and his crew.

Lauren Caddick ‘14 was named one of the ten seniors of the year by the Charlotte Observer. Seniors were nominated by area high school guidance counselors for their academic performance, character, and civic involvement.

Kathleen Davis ‘12, Ellen Orabone ‘10, Adam Steiner ‘10, and Kathryn Westfall ‘10 were named winners at the 19th Annual North Carolina State University Undergraduate Research Spring Symposium on April 22.

Natalie Cooke ‘10 was recently featured in Perspectives Online, the magazine of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, for her work in the Raleigh community. She served as head community liaison for a partnership involving NC State University and the Inter-Faith Food Shuttle where she coordinated student-led cooking and nutrition classes in Wake County.

Each semester, one NC State student is selected to speak on behalf of the entire graduating class. University Communications sat down with biological sciences and international studies double major Lianne Gonsalves, who reflected on everything from the Krispy Kreme Challenge to anthropological research in Guatemala.

Courtney Fox ‘10 was named a recipient of the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. The fellowship is Fox’s second national award, as she received the Morris K. Udall Scholarship in 2009.

The General H. Hugh Shelton Leadership Center and Park Scholarships program sponsored a talk by General Hugh Shelton entitled “The Role of the U.S. Military and Cabinet-level Agencies with Perspectives on Afghanistan, Iraq, and Haiti.” Shelton is the 14th Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and an alumnus of NC State University.

The Class of 2013 spent several days on the North Carolina coast in March exploring a leadership challenge facing the state – the erosion of the Outer Banks. During the field experience, Park Scholars engaged with politicians, engineers, and researchers to learn about the environmental, economic, political, and cultural issues connected to this coastal problem.

Joy Tongsri, Park Scholarships associate director, was selected to receive the 2010 Award for Excellence for the NC State University Chancellor’s Unit. She was selected from a field of outstanding employees who contribute greatly to the university.

More than 2,300 volunteers will complete over 95 projects in Raleigh on Saturday, March 27 as part of the 13th annual Service Raleigh. John Leshney, Senior Vice President of Development for The V Foundation for Cancer Research, will be the keynote speaker at the morning kickoff that begins at 7:30 am on Harris Field on NC State University’s campus.

Keith L. Fishburne, President and CEO of Special Olympics North Carolina, has been selected as the 2010 recipient of the William C. Friday Award, presented by the Class of 2010 Park Scholars at NC State University. Mr. Fishburne will be honored for his efforts to improve the lives of children and adults with intellectual disabilities at a special event at the NC State McKimmon Center on Wednesday, March 24, 6:00 pm, where he will present a talk on his work with Special Olympics North Carolina.

North Carolina State University has named 53 Park Scholars for the Class of 2014. These exceptional young women and men were selected based on their potential in the areas of scholarship, leadership, service, and character. The Park Scholarship is valued at $80,000 for residents of North Carolina and $135,000 for students from other states.

As co-president of the NC State chapter of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), Anahid Behrouzi ‘11 provides leadership for an organization dedicated to promoting engineering as a career aspiration among women by providing them with the necessary resources and support to be successful in the field.

A total of 6,000 runners took to the streets of Raleigh on Saturday, February 6 to take part in the annual Krispy Kreme Challenge. In one hour, brave participants ran two miles to the Krispy Kreme store on Peace Street, consumed a dozen doughnuts and ran an additional two miles back to the NC State campus. The event generated a record $50,000 which will be presented to the North Carolina Children’s Hospital.

The Park Scholarships program at NC State University has announced 105 Finalists for the fifteenth class of Park Scholars. The Finalists for the Class of 2014 were selected from among over 1,300 candidates.

In her new role as Director of Community Outreach with the Center for Student Leadership, Ethics and Public Service, Rebekah Jewell ‘12 will be responsible for educating her fellow NC State students about community issues, promoting volunteer opportunities to address those issues, and chairing the Community Outreach Programming Committee – a group that plans and executes programs to link students with nonprofit agencies in Raleigh.

John Crews ‘07 crossed the finish line in the Philadelphia Marathon in 2 hours, 17 minutes and 15 seconds. His time, a personal best, qualifies him for the 2012 Olympic Trials. Crews’ success in Philadelphia is one in a series of wins – including the Raleigh Marathon and Keybank Vermont Marathon.

Jezzette Rivera ‘10 was recently featured as part of the Community of Scholars series on the North Carolina State University website. To learn more about Rivera’s experiences as president of Mi Familia, co-chair of Service Raleigh and participant in a study abroad program to Guatemala, visit: http://www.ncsu.edu/featured-stories/community-of-scholars/nov-2009/jezzette-rivera/index.php

Drew Rothenberg ‘12 spent his summer in the United Kingdom working in his field of psychology alongside Drs. Michael Lamb and Lindsay Malloy at the University of Cambridge on a research project involving child abuse. The group analyzed forensic interviews of abused children and developed protocols which will allow young people to more easily discuss sexual and physical abuse.

Each year, second-year Park Scholars spend their fall break in Washington, D.C. analyzing a national issue as part of a unique learning experience which extends well beyond the classroom. This October, the Class of 2012 focused on exploring answers to the following question: “How is the image of the United States overseas affected by our foreign policy?”

During their senior year, the Class of 2010 had the opportunity to experience one of the natural wonders of the United States which encompasses over a million acres of stunning terrain. The class carried on the Park tradition of selecting one of America’s national parks as the setting for their senior retreat and spent three days in the Grand Canyon.